Lapplandschild

[sw_eno]

I recently aquired the photographic inheritance of a Gebirgsjäger.

This includes a document awarding him the Lapplandschild.

My question would be,

how many Lapplandschild were awarded?

I have seen Lapplandschilds of varying quality. Leather and iron, the latter
also in varying qualities. New information is appreciated.

sw_eno

[Tom Houlihan]

That is probably the one shield that was never formally issued. I've not seen anything defining numbers awarded.

Was this Gebirgsjager perhaps from Nord, or was he Heer?

[sw_eno]

He was in Gebirgs-Jäger-Regiment 136 and the Lapplandschild was awarded on July 20 1945 although I do not know where.

[Simon H]

Perhaps not formally issued, but issued nontheless. I'd draw your attention to a recent article in "The Armourer" magazine on the Lapplandschild. They do exist and as you rightly point out there is no "official" pattern for the award. Schilds issued after the end of hostilities were "denazified" and come in various patterns. Provenance is crucial is deciding on the pedigree or otherwise of an award.

[Klaus_Arzt]

The Lapplandshield was the last decoration of the German Wehrmacht produced during WW2.
Unfortunately there’s no specific date for the institution of this award due to the fact that the official data has been lost. It’s a quite known fact that General of the Gebirgstruppen F.Böhme asked the High Command to install this award in February 1945. But still the first evidence of its usage goes back to April 20th 1945 when members of the Kriegsmarine were decorated.

The institution of the Lapplandshield was rather hasty. This can be illustrated by the great variety in the citations and the shields themselves. Usually these citations are printed but still a great number of them is written. And even more: a great deal of these citations are decorated with the drawings of the shield. Almost all those citations are dated from july to September 1945.

The Lapplandshield was never produced in any factory. The recipient of the citation had to produce the shield by himself. This resulted in great variety of types of the shield and different types of material (iron or usually leather). As far as I know a great amount of this shield was made of leather and produced by german POW’s after the war. Hence so many designs and therefore it is almost impossible to distinguish between originals and replicas.
Regards

[sw_eno]

Klaus_Arzt thank you for all this information.

Simon H I do not believe I will be able to read this or any issue of "The Armourer" in the near future. Do they say anything about the number of Lappland Schilde awarded?